TOLLBOOTH
Fairuza Balk, Lenny Von Dohlen (1996, New Line, R, priced for rental) Set
in the Florida of the Weekly World News where people thrive on roadkill
and bodies are ground into fishing chum, this atmospheric semicomedy
follows a Miami Vice-obsessed tollbooth attendant who accidentally kills
his girlfriend's father. Like most such projects, this one succeeds on the
strength of its cast, with The Craft's Balk making the most of her sulking
power, and Twin Peaks' Von Dohlen doing a low-rent Nicolas Cage. Even
though the plot ultimately gets mired in its own weirdness, Tollbooth
proves that some good can come from bad things--even in the tired genre of
quirky indie films |